Spain makes an interesting case where the domestic fisc relied mainly on
sales taxes at high rates and in cascade (the cientos and alcabala,
condemned by Adam Smith). So taxes on international commerce were part of a
whole pattern of taxing commerce, and it is hard to say which suffered more.
We see the same pattern emerging in the U.S.A. today where the growth of
state sales taxes has led to a strong movement to legalize sales taxes on
interstate commerce, to avoid discriminating.

At the same time, Spain's imports for a time consisted mainly of stolen
precious metals, on a much grander scale then normal.  Spain also bolstered
its finances by conquering city-states and small nations and taxing THEIR
commerce, until and unless they successfully rebelled. They also enjoyed
what were virtually forced loans from bankers like the Fuggers of Augsburg,
whom they then stiffed and ruined.

In case of Cuba, Spain itself imposed import duties there, to secure a
foreign debt spent to benefit the mother country. This was a central issue
in the Cuban rebellion involving Jose' Marti'.  In the Treaty of Paris
ending the Spanish-American War this debt was repudiated - a rare case where
U.S. military might was used to confiscate the alleged "property" of
bankers!

At any rate, the Spanish "empire", once seriously challenged, fell apart
easily and quickly, owing to its mainly exploitive nature.

As to the HRE, that never was a substantive empire but a legal cum religious
fiction, and therefore hardly a case in point here.

Mason Gaffney



-----Original Message-----
From: Societies for the History of Economics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Womack, John
Sent: Saturday, March 22, 2014 3:12 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Query

Spanish empire, absolutely not. 
Nor the Holy Roman Empire, et al.

-----Original Message-----
From: Societies for the History of Economics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Avner Offer
Sent: Saturday, March 22, 2014 3:00 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Query

British empire: Definitely not. Many colonies had protective tariffs.
Chamberlain's Tariff Reform campaign of the early Edwardian period was an
attempt to create an Imperial customs union (with exceptions), but it
failed. 

Avner Offer

======================================================
From Avner Offer, Chichele Professor Emeritus of Economic History,
University of Oxford
  All Souls College, High St., Oxford OX1 4AL, tel. 44 1865 281404
 email: [log in to unmask]
 personal website:
 http://sites.google.com/site/avoffer/avneroffer
________________________________________
From: Societies for the History of Economics [[log in to unmask]] on behalf of
Robert Leeson [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 22 March 2014 06:07
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Query

Was the second British Empire a customs union?  During the first: wasn't the
1764 Sugar Act inconsistent with a customs union?

RL


----- Original Message -----
From: "mason gaffney" <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Saturday, 22 March, 2014 2:30:12 AM
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Query

Re Oscar’s query, if he really means “the concept” (and not just the
German word Zollverein), most empires of the ancient world were probably
customs unions, held together by a hegemon like Rome.  The early classical
economists, e.g. Turgot and the Physiocrats, agitated for internal free
trade, the original idea of laissez faire.  The French Revolution and
Napoleon’s brief empire spread the idea around Europe.  The United
(Vereinigten) States was a custom union, with free internal trade and high
tariffs.  It was bound by its Commerce Clause, reflecting Turgot’s ideas
and also his personal influence on our “Founding Fathers”.  The British
Empire was a customs union. Current treaty-making is mostly about the
formation and disintegration of customs unions.



Mason Gaffney





From: Societies for the History of Economics [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On
Behalf Of Oscar Ugarteche
Sent: Friday, March 21, 2014 7:23 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SHOE] Query



Dear all

I am working on customs unions and the furthest back I can see is a quote
from Simon Bolivar mentioning the concept of the zollverein. Was this F.
List's idea or is there an older origin?

Regards



Oscar



2014-03-20 16:19 GMT+00:00 Thomas Humphrey <[log in to unmask]>:

For what it is worth, Joseph Schumpeter in his 1954 History of Economic
Analysis, attributes the aggregate demand concept to Knut Wicksell, and even
before Wicksell to Thomas Malthus. On page 623 of his History, Schumpeter
writes that "The idea of a schedule of aggregate demand for consumers' goods
taken as a whole, though without an awareness of the problem this concept
raises, is in Malthus' analytical set-up, and it may be therefore claimed
with justice that he anticipated Wicksell, who was the first-flight
economist to adopt it."



Thomas Humphrey





On Mar 20, 2014, at 9:32 AM, Steve Kates wrote:







The question really is who can take us back before Keynes? So here, from The
General Theory page 25:



"Let Z be the aggregate supply price of the output from employing N men, the
relationship between Z and N being written Z = φ(N), which can be called
the Aggregate Supply Function. Similarly, let D be the proceeds which
entrepreneurs expect to receive from the employment of N men, the
relationship between D and N being written D = f(N), which can be called the
Aggregate Demand Function."



And then there is this from page 32:



"The idea that we can safely neglect the aggregate demand function is
fundamental to the Ricardian economics, which underlie what we have been
taught for more than a century. Malthus, indeed, had vehemently opposed
Ricardo’s doctrine that it was impossible for effective demand to be
deficient; but vainly. For, since Malthus was unable to explain clearly
(apart from an appeal to the facts of common observation) how and why
effective demand could be deficient or excessive, he failed to furnish an
alternative construction; and Ricardo conquered England as completely as the
Holy Inquisition conquered Spain. Not only was his theory accepted by the
city, by statesmen and by the academic world. But controversy ceased; the
other point of view completely disappeared; it ceased to be discussed. The
great puzzle of Effective Demand with which Malthus had wrestled vanished
from economic literature. You will not find it mentioned even once in the
whole works of Marshall, Edgeworth and Professor Pigou, from whose hands the
classical theory has received its most mature embodiment. It could only live
on furtively, below the surface, in the underworlds of Karl Marx, Silvio
Gesell or Major Douglas."



I have seen the phrase aggregate demand used before that but in a kind of
aimless way. But I am interested in its use prior to 1936 as well.



On 20 March 2014 23:52, <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Colleagues:

      Who and when was the terms "aggregate demand" and "aggregate supply"
first used?

Robin Neill







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